Bored

Who would've thought the jobbers in the match would've become former champions in the WWF. We all know Dwayne Gill as Gillberg, but you also have Headbanger Thrasher... well, not that anyone really cares, but still kinda interesting. I always find fun in that, like the time I found an old RAW tape and one half of the tag team jobbers fighting the "Two Dudes with Attitudes" was a young Chris Kanyon. Um well okay CRZ didn't really go into detail with jobber matches during his early recapping: Smoking Scotsmen v. Dwayne Gill & Glen Ruth - Heenan says Glen's mother, who Lord Alfred Hayes dated for awhile, is Dr. Ruth. Heenan saves this overlong match.

JEFF HARDY (European champion - Cameron, North Carolina - 218 pounds) v. ROB VAN DAM (Intercontinental champion - Battle Creek, Michigan - 235 pounds) in a ladder match to unify the titles Hardy walks underneath the ladder; van Dam does not. Chad Patton is outside the ring but ladder rules state he won't be neede 'til the end. Lockup, van Dam goes behind, standing switch, van Dam drops down with an armdrag, Hardy with a headscissors, both men back up. We go again. Lockup, side headlock by Hardy - van Dam powers out, Hardy up and over, van Dam with a dropkick but (I think) Hardy hooked the ropes and avoided contact. van Dam...goes for a cover? Well, they're rolling around on the mat - backing into the corner, Hardy punching the gut, kick, kick, into the opposite corner, Hardy up and tries to go over but the feel land on the shoulders...van Dam tries to pull Hardy out but finds himself on the wrong end of a headscissors takeover - van Dam against the ropes - Hardy clotheslines him out! Hardy grabs the ladder - van Dam back in - baseball slide dropkick to the ladder out! van Dam on the apron - moonsault to the floor! van Dam takes the ladder and sets it up under the title - Hardy just there in time - shot to the back - and pulls him hard into the centre. Stomp, stomp. Into the ropes is reversed, van Dam with the splits and Hardy is over - Hardy grabs van Dam's legs and does a split-legged double legdrop over them. Hardy puts the ladder inposition - climbing up - van Dam pulls him off, back first. van Dam grabs the ladder - Hardy up, dropkicking the ladder out of his hands. After sharing a look, each man leaves the ring on an opposite side and grabs another ladder from the floor. Two ladders in the ring, two men in the ring - there's a joust - they do it again - van Dam drops his ladder...so he hits Hardy's with a spin kick putting Hardy down. "RVD" chant will out volume squealing girls any day, I guess. Hardy placed on the ladder - van Dam off the ropes with a tumbling run splash. van Dam sets his own ladder underneath the belt and starts the climb - touching the belt - but Hardy is up after him - shots in the back - and a Russian legsweep off the ladder to the mat! Hardy puts his ladder on top of van Dam and climbs to the top - swantonbomb onto the ladder! That hurt both men but it looks like Hardy is up first. Foot Locker replay as Hardy starts up the ladder. van Dam up - climbing the opposite side - right, right, Hardy right, van Dam right, reaching but not finding, right, right, sunset flip over the top of the ladder and Hardy goes down powerbomb style! Give THAT a Foot Locker replay from the belt cam! van Dam drops the leg out of the spin - Hardy on the ladder - Rolling Thunder by Rob van Dam! Ladder standing again. Hey, remember last year when these guys were doing this for the hardcore title? Is this elevation? Hardy up - using HIS ladder to strike van Dam - Hardy climbing up - van Dam back kick, back kick, kicks out the ladder and Hardy flips to the mat. van Dam with a SPLASH from HIS ladder! Foot Locker replay of Hardy's tumble...and van Dam's (not a frog) splash - van Dam is up - he's gonna get it this time - got it. Ladies and gentlemen, we have a new - 37th, and final - European champion. (6:58) From here on out (well, for tonight anyway) he's the "unified intercontinental champion." van Dam helps Hardy up and raises his hand post-match. Let's take one more replay of the final two moves. SHAWN STASIAK (already in the ring) v. D'LO BROWN (already in the ring) referee: JACK DOAN You know, I wouldn't expect this match to go longer than TWO minutes, actually. Kick by Stasiak, right, suplex - no, Brown on his feet - bodyslam, cover, 1, 2, no. Into the ropes, heel kick. 1, 2, no. Right, into the ropes is reversed, Brown ducks, Stasiak with a powerlsam for 2. "Thirty seconds!" Hey, that actually WAS thirty seconds! Brown with a small package for 2. European uppercut by Stasiak - he goes to an armbar. "What the hell are you doing? You got two minutes - what is THAT?" So Stasiak moves to a hammerlock - "All right, thirty seconds!" - scoop - slam on the hammerlock. Kneedrop - "ten nine eight" - cover, 1 - "seven six five...you should have entertained me." Right. "Four" Right. "Three" - Right, left, right - "Two" - TWO BIG SAMOAN LOOKIN' GUYS hit the ring. "One!" Brown gets whipped, pressed up and Samoan dropped down. Stasiak gets a full nelson into a slam. Brown takes a top rope splash - and Stasiak gets a Vaderbomb. I'm guessing these are the "Island Boyz." They leave the ring....and we go to an ad break. Oh, yeah - let's stop the official time at "One" and call it (1:28)

Wasn't Phil Apollo one of the face Doinks a year or 2 later? Well I'm Bored sooooooooo...let's break out some old CRZ recaps for these matches. Doink (The Clown) v. Phil Apollo - Vince amazes me with his move calling. Vince mentions that Luger will talk about getting expelled from college, as well as steroids in wrestling, in later interviews. Hmmmmmm. Doink wins with the buttdrop off the top (I guess the Kunze Stump Puller is gone), then give Savage a look. Taking the mic, *we* get an ad break instead.

October 1, 1978 the day I was born: http://www.retrosheet.org/boxesetc/10011978.htm The final day of the season as the Red Sox beat the Blue Jays 5-0 and the Yankees lose to the Indians 9-2 to to set up a first place tie. The next day was the divisional playoff game where Bucky Dent hit the infamous homerun that would win the game for the Yankees and continue the curse. I actually went to school with a nephew of Bucky Dent...he was a douche bag.

Hmmm do you know what inning it was? I see from the play account Carter had a two run double in the 1st. To add I see the double was hit to Tony Gwynn and knocked in Tim Raines and Andre Dawson...good time to go into labour.

Walker had a couple of good years with the Expos before he went to the Rockies. Things to remember also that will help is he did win an MVP in '97 and he's won seven gold gloves. Oh and for those who may have been wondering Molitor and Eckersley are eligible for next year and will be the likely HOF class of 2004.

Well I've used to find boxscores to games I went to when I was younger. I found the boxscore to the very first baseball game I ever went to on May 11, 1986 between the A's and Red Sox because I remembered the final score: http://www.retrosheet.org/boxesetc/B05110OAK1986.htm Hell could look up the day you were born and see who did what that day.

Oh another amazing baseball stat site is retrosheet.org. They have every single boxscore to every single game played since 1967. Just awesome.

Well the site is run privately and not by MLB. There is a football-reference.com I believe but its not nearly as in depth as this site. Oh and I was mistaken the formula does take into account if a player played on a championship team.

A good way to figure out how likely an active player or player who hasn't be retired long enough to be eligible yet is to get in the Hall of Fame is to go to basball-reference.com. They have a Hall of Fame monitor which is a statsical formula to do just that. I want copy the whole formula out but here is a brief explanation of it from the stie: "It attempts to assess how likely (not how deserving) an active player is to make the Hall of Fame. It's rough scale is 100 means a good possibility and 130 is a virtual cinch." Now of course this is a statistical formula so it can't take into account where a player played (i.e. playing in New York gives a player a lot more attention), if a player was perceived as a winner and how many championships they won, or if the player was a complete dick who no one liked. Here are hitter listings for non-eligible players with a score of 130 or higher who would be locks going by the formula (stats through 2002): 1. Barry Bonds 278 1. Tony Gwynn 278 3. Wade Boggs 268 4. Cal Ripken Jr. 236 5. Rickey Henderson 194 6. Roberto Alomar 193 7. Ken Griffey Jr. 192 8. Mark McGwire 169 9. Alex Rodriguez 167 10. Paul Molitor 165 10. Sammy Sosa 165 12. Frank Thomas 160 13. Mike Piazza 151 13. Larry Walker 151 15. Rafael Palmeiro 139 16. Jeff Bagwell 136 16. Ivan Rodriguez 136 18. Albert Belle 134 19. Edgar Martinez 130 Now here are players with a score of between 100-129 which means they have a good chance of making the Hall of Fame at this moment: 20. Bernie Williams 126 21. Derek Jeter 121 22. Juan Gonzalez 120 23. Manny Ramirez 119 24. Barry Larkin 118 25. Todd Helton 117 26. Andres Galarraga 111 27. Chipper Jones 110 28. Craig Biggio 105 29. Jose Canseco 103 29. Nomar Garciaparra 103 31. Valdimir Guerrero 101 32. Fred McGriff 100 Now here are the pitcher's rankings and there of course a lot fewer listed. Obviously its likely in future years batter standards to make the Hall of Fame will be raised and pitcher standards are lower but this is based on how players and pitchers have been voted in in the past. Here are pitchers with a score of 130 or higher meaning their locks at the moment (through 2002): 1. Randy Johnson 279 2. Roger Clemens 260 3. Greg Maddux 212 4. Dennis Eckersley 166 5. Pedro Martinez 161 6. Tom Glavine 135 Here are the (two) pitchers of scores between 100-129 meaning they are likely HOF at the moment: 7. Curt Schilling 122 8. John Franco 115 Oh and to add to the list here are I guess they would call bubble pitchers with scores between 90-99 but with pitching standards likely to be lowered these pitchers may have a good shot after all at the moment: 9. David Cone 97 10. Randy Myers 94 10. Mariano Rivera 94 12. Trevor Hoffman 92 13. John Smoltz 91 14. Mike Mussina 90 Now there ya go again purely on stats and obviously Jose Canseco won't be going in and Albert Belle is unlikely and the likes of Andres Galarraga and Fred McGriff will be hurt by playing in a hitters era.

Well now apparantly the reports that Giles nixed the deals are false and the A's, Mariners, and Padres are all still interested. Pat Gillick of the Mariners is well known for not doing anything at the deadline so I'm wondering if the Mariners have entered themselves in the chase for Giles just to make the A's give up more. Oh and the deal with Giles is his contract runs through 2006 but he has an option to void his deal and become a free agent after this year. I haven't been able to find a full breakdown of his deal but his average yearly salary is $9 million and considering the current market in baseball I don't see him getting that much more than he's currently earning so its really up in the air as to what he would do.

The 4-team deal went through finally with addition is Marc Jackson goes to Philadelphia from Minnesota. That's the center not the point guard.

Speaking of Giles...I read on A's message board that he apparantly has nixed a deal to Oakland...FUCK! Have fun losing 100 games every year.

Well in that case I personally support competitive marriage in this country.

Is competitive the new word for gay?

Its official...Eddie is the new Rock. Oh and Angle jobbing possibly means he'll be winning the title this weekend. I had for a while thought Brock was a lock to retain but with the talks of a Brock/Vince match and now this I'm actually not sure who's going to win this weekend. I still would prefer Brock retains and then drops the title to Angle at SummerSlam.

Oh apparantly the prom and topless pics are Kate Faber after all...but really who knows at this point.

Rey Mysterio & Billy Kidman vs. Matt Hardy & Shannon Moore Billy Gunn vs. Jamie Noble Rhyno vs. Eddie Guerrero A.P.A. vs. Chuck Palumbo & Johnny Stamboli Brock Lesnar, Kurt Angle, & Zach Gowan vs. The Big Show & The World's Greatest Tag Team

Oh and just a couple of rumors to throw out, both involving the Padres as they might be the team willing to take on Jason Kendall's contract to get Brian Giles from Pittsburgh. Also if the Royals can't get Juan Gonzalez they are going to go after Rondell White of the Padres.

I don't know how it'd create a problem at point. Jackson is superior to Claxton so Jackson would start and Claxton is the back-up. Claxton would probably be pissed because he probably signed based that he'd start but oh well. Anyways I doubt the rumor will lead to anything.

BLOCKBUSTER DEAL....Yankees acquire Jesse Orosco from the Padres.

I would be SHOCKED if this deal went through and the Kings would be insane to do it. As a Warriors fans I'd love it though. Richardson is a human highlight real but really not much else and Fortson is a big contract they need to dump.

Word on Colon is teams have called about him but the White Sox still think they have a shot with 13 games against the Royals in the second half so don't expect a trade. Hot off the presses: Cubs acquire Kenny Lofton and Aramis Ramirez from the Pirates for Jose Hernandez and I think a minor leaguer.

Durazo in right? Ummm considering he's only played four games there in his career don't count on it. There is a reason why he is a DH and its not only to keep him healthy. Any deal the A's make though they will likely have to make another deal just to dump salary because of their owner. They are likely shopping Terrence Long to some sucker right now. I'm sure they'd LOVE to get rid of Jermaine Dye's contract but not even Billy Beane would be able to convince a team to take him.

Lidle has a 5.88 ERA and has been stuck on 10 wins for a while. With the A's offense he'd have 10 or more losses with that ERA. Still talks about getting J.D. Drew, which would ironically enough involve Lidle going to the Cardinals for Drew and then the Jays would ship him to Oakland. Still a small chance of Brian Giles but the Pirates want Jason Kendall to be part of the deal and the A's don't need a catcher and definently can't take on his contract which is waaaaaaaay more than he's worth.